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Monday, July 28, 2003

Chabad is there

"And I have heard the cries of the People of Israel . . . " --Exodus 6:5

With over 220 Chabad Centers stretching across the full length and breadth of Israel, Tzeirei Chabad offers support and comfort to victims of terror and their families by providing financial, spiritual and emotional assistance as needed. Chabad’s Victim of Terror program includes a network of emergency response teams that intervene with victims and their families within hours after an attack and continues with long term, community-based assistance and activities provided by Chabad Houses located in the victim’s community.

Chabad’s Terror Victims Project deployed its Emergency Response Team, April 30, following a terror attack when a Palestinian suicide bomber detonated an explosive at the entrance to a popular beachfront pub in Tel Aviv near the American Embassy. Three Israelis were killed in the blast--six among the more than 60 wounded were listed in serious condition.

*At Wolfson Hospital in Holon, Rabbi and Holon Shaliach Rabbi Yerachmiel Gorelick visited two brothers wounded in the blast. They had been performing at the pub as musicians.

*An elderly couple reacted warmly to the rabbis who visited their injured grandson. "A Chabad rabbi performed the bar mitzvahs of our grandchildren," they noted. "Thank you for caring."

*One victim, a religious man, asked the rabbis if he could put on tefillin. That his body was covered with cuts, bruises and burns and that he could not move his body did not matter. "I put tefillin every morning," said the man, who recalled standing only several yards away from the bomber at the time of the blast. "Were it not for you, I could not pray today."

*At Tel Aviv's Tel Hashomer Hospital, the rabbis met the parents of a seriously wounded young man, as they waited anxiously in the corridor. Their son lay uncounscious in intensive care. The rabbis prayed with them and offered to make a "mi sheberach" at synagogue services.

*The grateful family of one survivor said they knew a local Chabad rabbi in Tel Aviv. They asked that arrangements be made to have the household mezuzahs checked.

*Chabad will be assisting the mourning family of Yanai Weiss, 46, of Holon, throughout the course of the shiva.